報告：台海衝突將對中國經濟造成巨大損失

PRICE OF WAR: If a conflict disrupted Strait traffic, China would have to transport some goods by land, creating bottlenecks and harming regional economies, a report said

By Chen Cheng-liang and Sam Garcia / Staff writers

China would face massive economic costs if it blockaded or invaded Taiwan, a Washington think tank said in a report, adding that “a conflict over Taiwan poses the gravest threat to trade in the region.”

While Chinese officials have long warned of a “Malacca dilemma,” China faces a more severe Taiwan Strait quandary considering that in 2024 “nearly US$1.3 trillion of Chinese trade transited the Taiwan Strait — nearly 33 percent more than through the Malacca Strait,” the Center for Strategic and International Studies said in a report published on Wednesday last week titled “Troubled Straits: Analyzing Trade Chokepoints in the South China Sea.”

The Taiwan Strait is not only Taiwan’s lifeline, but also a critical artery for China’s own economic survival, the report said.

“Military action by China that disrupts the Taiwan Strait could harm China’s economy even more severely than a disruption of the Malacca Strait,” it said.

The Taiwan Strait supplies China with key industrial imports including oil, coal, natural gas, ores and metals arriving from resource-rich countries, it said.

In 2024, 33 percent of China’s total imports and 58 percent of its maritime imports transited the Taiwan Strait, the report said.

In addition, the Taiwan Strait “is a vital conduit for China’s own domestic shipping,” it said.

China relies on the Taiwan Strait to transport goods produced in southern technological hubs such as Shenzhen and Guangzhou to eastern cities, including Shanghai and Ningbo, and northern cities like Tianjin, it said.

If a conflict disrupted traffic through the Strait, China could transport these goods by land, but moving goods from Guangzhou to Tianjin that way “can cost about three times the price of moving the same goods by sea,” the report said.

If China had to switch all its north-south shipping from sea routes to land routes, it could “create bottlenecks within China’s inland logistics networks, sending ripple effects throughout the economy,” it said.

In addition, while only 3 to 4 percent of US trade passes through the Luzon, Malacca and Taiwan straits annually, these strategic passages are crucial to key US allies in Asia, the report said.

“For US allies Japan, South Korea and the Philippines, the risks are much greater, especially in the Taiwan Strait,” it said, adding that these countries shipped US$755 billion worth of goods through the Taiwan Strait in 2024.

The Strait carried 28 percent of Japan’s total trade in 2024, with key technologies such as semiconductors accounting for one-quarter of all Japanese imports through the Strait, it said.

The report also said that Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi and Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr have warned that a Chinese military move in the Taiwan Strait could draw their countries into the conflict.

If Beijing were to impose a blockade in the Taiwan Strait, it could jeopardize trade routes carrying 16 percent of its exports and 58 percent of its maritime imports, as well as key domestic trade routes, potentially paralyzing large parts of China’s economy, the report said.